Minutes 5–15: add your first database
A database is a collection of pages that share the same properties. Think of it as a table where each row opens into a full page, which is why a project list, a reading log and a client directory are all built from exactly the same material. The table you see is only a view; the pages underneath are the substance.
Open your Tasks page. Type /table and choose Table – Database, not the plain table, which is just a grid of cells with none of the magic. Name it Task Tracker. Notion creates three columns for you: Name, Tags, Date. Rename them to suit your job and add the properties you identified earlier.
To add a property, click the + at the right edge of the header row and pick a type:
- Status — Not started, In progress, Done. Notion ships with sensible defaults; edit them if your work moves differently.
- Date — due dates, or the day something landed on your desk.
- Select — a category, such as client name, course or subject.
- Person — who owns it. Useful even when the only person is you.
Now add four or five rows using real items, not placeholders. "Draft proposal for Alice" beats "Task 1", because you will actually recognise it tomorrow morning and feel a small pang of guilt in the right direction. Click into a row and the page opens: properties at the top, blank space below for notes, checklists, files, meeting minutes — anything you like.
That double identity is the whole trick. The row is the page; the page is the row. Once you have seen it a few times, the rest of Notion stops feeling like a maze and starts feeling like Lego.
Minutes 15–25: shape the same data into views
Your data now exists in exactly one place, but it does not have to be looked at in exactly one way. Next to the name of your database you will see a small + and a tab called something like Table. Click the + to add another view of the same rows.
The two that matter most at the start:
- Board — groups your rows into columns. Choose Status as the grouping property and you have a kanban board you can drag tasks across when they move.
- List — compact, one line per item, ideal on a narrow screen or for a simple checklist.
Then filter. In the board view, click Filter, choose Status is In progress, and name the view Doing now. Add a second view on the table, filtered to Date is within This week, and call it This week. Sorts work the same way: by Date ascending so the nearest deadline sits on top.
Nothing has been duplicated. You are looking at the same five rows through five different windows, which is why you can add a task once and trust it to appear wherever it is relevant.
Minutes 25–30: make Home worth opening
A workspace only survives if you know where to start each morning, and that is Home's entire job. Go back to it and type /linked view of database, then select Task Tracker. Choose the Doing now view. You have just embedded live data: complete a task on the Tasks page and it disappears here too.
Add a second linked view beneath it, filtered to today's date, so Home answers one question — what am I doing next? — before you can wander off into a side project. Finish with a short heading and a link to Notes, and you are done. Thirty minutes, roughly.
If your homepage needs scrolling to be useful, it is a document, not a dashboard.
Three habits that keep a workspace alive
Building the thing is the easy half. These three habits are what stop it quietly dying in three weeks' time.
- Capture first, sort later. When something arrives, dump it into the database with a rough name and no properties. Filing it properly takes ten seconds; forgetting it takes the same amount of time and costs far more.
- One inbox, not five. Resist the urge to create a second list because the first feels untidy. Untidy is survivable. Split systems are not, because you will always check the wrong one.
- Review on Fridays. Spend five minutes clearing Done items, renaming anything vague, and deleting rows you no longer care about. A workspace that is pruned stays trustworthy.
Two mistakes that stall most beginners
The first is decorating before using. Coloured covers, custom icons and nested dashboards feel like progress, but they are procrastination wearing a nice outfit. Add them later, once the workspace has earned them.
The second is copying a stranger's template wholesale. Templates built for someone else's job come with someone else's properties, and you will spend more time deleting than you would have spent building. Steal ideas, not structures.
If you keep those two in mind, the blank page stops being intimidating. It is just a table waiting for its first real row — and you already know how to make one.
Photo: rawpixel / Pixabay